Double Trouble
by FeelsAllOverThePlace
Summary: Loki unveils a new trick and leaves The Avengers bewildered as they quite literally find themselves face to face with… themselves, but with a substantial twist. How do the gang cope co-existing with their 'new' team members?
1. Just Your Average Day

Another distress call was what had started all the trouble. Loki was sighted far north by a SHIELD outpost, and in these times even a sighting of the shifty god of mischief was reason enough to pursue. Either they would frighten him off to a more easily monitored part of the world or hopefully he would scamper back to Asgard. The latter was only considered for the benefit of Thor, who always seemed to perk up at the possibility, however slight, that his 'brother' would return home.

How far north Loki had managed to get, undetected, was enough of a worry for SHIELD that not only did Nick Fury call The Avengers back together to get the sneaky bastard, but he too wanted to accompany them for some friendly… questioning of the God of Lies and Mischief. He was taking Maria Hill and Phil Coulson (who was only just returning to field work after his framed death, a life model decoy being the Coulson that had 'died' for the sake of motivating the boy band back in the first Loki incident), as they were his left and right hands, eyes and ears at SHIELD, after all.

The team had all responded without hesitation, gathering aboard the Hellicarrier for action all within an hour of the summon. Fury had been slightly surprised at their efficiency especially with Thor's distance, Tony's flippant attitude and Bruce's reluctance to be called to action. Thor explained his promptness regarding the fact Loki was involved and that he had also been on Midgard, coincidentally, to visit some of his friends. Bruce reasoned that if the other guy had to come out somewhere, he'd rather it be in the icy wilderness of the north around his teammates who could handle it. Tony merely gave a shrug of the shoulders and stated something about missing being in action and that Pepper had been out so she couldn't remind him that he was meant to be keeping a 'clean slate' promise.

Natasha and Clint were always easy to find, Clint had been aboard the Hellicarrier already when word was sent out, and Natasha had to just be called back from a mission. Steve too was quick on the scene, having been assisting the government where ever needed after his road trip post New York and his own personal experience of finding, and fighting along the way, his old friend Bucky. The situation was a little calmer now, the two kept a little contact, but there was still a great rift there. Fury hoped Steve could fix that soon, because until all was a little more stable, it put Fury's plans of recruiting Bucky into SHIELD on hold. Natasha and Bucky were rather close, from what he could tell, but he didn't want to put all his chips in that basket. Having the elusive Winter Soldier in a dual locked alliance would be much more secure for SHIELD's aims.

Speaking of Bucky, he was not a part of this mission, but had currently taken refuge and political asylum on the Hellicarrier for a while to hide from his former Russian overlords. But whenever Fury seemed to turn to talk to an Avenger about this current situation during their flight north, he always seemed to see the Winter Soldier lurking around a corner or sitting in the room, always somewhere close enough he could listen in before being shooed away.

Soon enough, everyone was sent to their stations, Fury barked his last few orders to the crew of the Hellicarrier through a microphone as he, Agent Hill, Agent Coulson, and all of The Avenger's started to ready two Quinjets for decent and landing. Clint and Natasha exchange a look and a smile as they slipped on their pilot headpieces and into the driver's seats of separate planes. Thor, Tony, Fury and Hill slipped into Natasha's plane while Steve, Bruce and Coulson took Clint's. Before long the jets were soaring smoothly through the air, leaving the Hellicarrier far behind and above in the crystal sky.

Clint frowned as he glanced to the stats monitor, raising a brow that something didn't quite add up.

"Hey Bruce, you haven't Hulked Out, have you? Though I assume there'd be a lot more panic and yelling if you had…" The archer let that thought trail off before radioing in to Fury in the other Quinjet.

"Director Fury, either the measuring system of the Quinjet is off, Steve ate way more than he usually does, or… We might have a stow away on bored."

Unwilling to land to investigate, Fury scowled, swivelling his head to stare at the patch of wall in the general direction the other Quinjet was soaring beside them.

"…Get one of your passengers to look around, preferably someone who won't freak out and turn green and angry if we're hit while we fly."

Repeating Fury's order, though not quite as specifically, Clint didn't need to choose as Steve had already unclipped and risen, starting to search around the main compartment before slipping into the small back armoury.

A few minutes later, a slightly annoyed voice buzzed in Clint's ear, the Captain not sounding impressed with his findings.

"Found the problem, Fury's not going to like this, seems we've got an extra squad member. Bucky claims he was restocking the armoury to help us out and hadn't noticed we'd boarded the plane. He's sticking to the story he would have got off if he thought he had time."

Clint radioed Fury with the situation and the Director of SHIELD cussed loudly. He should have known something like this would happen-

"Well, I suppose he's coming with. Better be goddamned suited up, I don't need another rooky disaster out here, especially not with Loki. But I suppose we can take all the help we can get."

If only Bucky was just as interested in becoming a SHIELD agent as he was with assisting The Avengers.

A little over half an hour, and the crew were ready for descent, Loki was a little over a kilometre away, and to protect their ships they didn't want to get too close for landing. Thankfully the bright white blanket of snow, and the flakes that currently pelted down were providing an excellent cover as well as a challenge for Clint and Natasha.

As Clint dropped a little too sharply in one moment, as soon as he was steadied and okay, he heard Natasha's laugh chime over the intercom.

"Getting a little rusty there Barton, forgetting things in your old age, hmm?"

He laughed too, just a moment before sitting more alertly over the controls, smirking.

"Not at all, you just know safe was never my thing."

Once both jets were safely touched down, the squads exited and Fury quickly talked strategy. Maria, Coulson, Bucky and himself would stay back in defensive positions with long range weapons, ready to open fire if Loki could not be talked down. Bucky had scowled at this for a moment before Maria reminded him, rather briskly as if being angry he was here, that he was a sniper expert anyway so he shouldn't have a problem with this.

Clint was long distance too, but he would approach, as well as Natasha, in the main body of The Avengers to prove the point to Loki that any future discord and they would indeed all come as one to knock him into next week. Besides, Clint was quick and knew how to turn most landscapes into an advantage, he was an excellent tactician. Natasha would be semi-close range, as she normally was, but would give the big hitters space to really hit Loki hard. Thor, Tony, Bruce and Steve would be the main body. Thor would be granted a chance to attempt to reason with his brother, no matter what he was up to, Cap would then be a last chance warning and the first striker if there was conflict. Tony would be at the ready for this scenario, too, and come in as the second strike all while giving Bruce a chance to suit up and hopefully end the contact all together. A tactic like this, hopefully swift, would help Thor to avoid much involvement in the battle so he wouldn't feel even more guilty about fighting his brother whom he already believed he had failed. And it meant safety for the more vulnerable members of the team who were still only human, despite their extraordinary gifts.

Trekking out to Loki with the plan fresh in their minds, they found themselves lead to the entrance of a large cave, carved in rock and ice in the side of a mountain. Fury frowned as he regard this, a change in tactics that meant his long range team may actually have to move in since there was no visibility on the outside.

"Coulson… Hill, I want you to stay at the entrance." He ordered, and his two agents immediately slipped either side of the cave. Bucky was internally brightened that he wasn't ordered to stay, but let nothing but a calm, stoic demeanour show through.

The group of eight entered the cave, wary and slow moving. It was a winding carved path, that was wide enough to avoid claustrophobia, but was ominous in that you could never see too far ahead or behind due to curves in the walls. After some time, they emerge in a cavern that must have been at the heart of the mountain. Light bounced off the sleet walls, illuminating the vast icy space, this luminance came from various points, pale green glowing orbs all intertwined and connected. They all lead back to one fixed point, where the subject of their search sat, legs crossed, on a rocky alter in the middle of the room.

Loki himself was surrounded in this pale green light, it must have been magic in some form. He looked almost peaceful, eyes closed and mouth a flat line until he tensed. He had noticed the eight people beginning to fan the room under Fury's orders. Bucky and Fury had taken cover reasonably close to the entry, Clint and Natasha were slightly closer, but still towards the edges of the room. While Bruce, Tony and Steve all followed straight behind Thor, at the ready to strike.

Loki, behind his magic field, gave them a smile too sharp to be friendly, his green eyes betraying malice as his mind wandered to last time he had seen these Avengers all together, when they had stopped his attempt on Midgard and slaughtered the Chitauri army. But now was different, the God of Lies and Mischief did not need those pitiful aliens existence, he had tricks of his own to reveal… A new ally who was every bit as cunning as himself, and now their plan might finally blossom into reality.

"Brother, what is it that you are here for, back on Midgard when you know you are not welcome here?" Thor's voice was hard, but there was the undertone Loki could always manage to pick up, the one that almost pleaded to not end in a vicious battle. After his imprisonment in Asgard, Loki had eventually been freed to assist Thor, tracking Malekith the Accursed in an attempt to help his brother thwart a Dark Elf invasion. While his brother had been battling the leader, Loki had scampered, fleeing to a realm that even the Aesir dare not follow him, The Realm of Fire, Muspelheim. The time there had been difficult, especially for his frost giant blood, but it was better than being forced back into a tiny cell in imprisonment or being freed but having to appeal to the people of his home that he had all but wrote off. It was only when he had left Muspelheim, trying to visit an uncharted realm, he had stumbled across a most peculiar place, and met someone just as devious as himself. They had conspired for months, hatching this scheme. Midgard had been their place of planning, but they had been very subtle. He had gone to where their world was and initiated the preparations there, while they completed the work here, avoiding the issue of Loki's sighting being an instant pursuit and detainment.

Speaking at last to Thor, his voice was cold. "Is it that I am welcomed anywhere? Should I care these pathetic mortals do not take to my company? It is not as if I have sought to be among them, let me be here in peace, and keep your nose out of my business, Thor, or else I may have to break it for you a third time." Loki was gambling on angering Thor, in fact, he was almost counting on the team who had thwarted him last time to gear up for an attack. The circle of magic around him rippled, its aura pressing and powerful as the difficult little spell grew only all the more potent the longer it was cast.

Thor's blue eyes flashed electric, the Thunderer's grip tightening on Mjolnir as he shook his head, giving Steve the subtle sign that he would not be able to reason, his temper already rising much too far for the usual 'hit first, talk later' warrior.

The Captain stepped forward raising a glove to point at Loki as his voice sounded, serious and he didn't mess around, getting straight to the point.

"This is your last chance, Loki. You know we won't hesitate to take you in by force, so what's it going to be?"

The God of Lied and Mischief's smile became slightly feral as his eyes glinted at the challenge. "Oh you know I look forward to it."

And so the assault began, though not with half the result Fury had expected. Cap's shield was swiftly thrown, Tony's palm blasters began firing, Hawkeye sent a flurry of arrows, as did Natasha, Bucky and himself except with bullets, but each and every hit was absorbed by that light green glowing sphere around Loki. The smaller points around the room began to flicker and seemed to echo the sounds of the attacks that had passed, Fury uttered a quick order to Phil and Maria to join them inside quickly. While everyone reloaded, Clint readied a trick arrow, Steve got his shield, Tony auto targeted, Thor readied lightning and Hulk finally made his appearance, Loki just began to laugh mockingly at them. The moment Coulson and Hill arrived and trained their trigger on the god, everyone broke into a flurry of attacks, bombarding their cackling target-

At a moment when everyone landed a hit simultaneously on the magical green shielding light, everything suddenly changed.

Loki's barrier, and all the points around it disappeared in a powerful discharge of magical energy, an explosion that shattered the whole carven and sent everyone flying in every direction. The walls crumbled around them, rock and ice showering down as darkness engulfed them. When Steve hit the ground he had enough time and momentum only to fling himself to where Natasha and Clint had been stationed, trying to cover all three of them from falling chunks of the cave. Hulk had similarly smashed his way out of the pile he had instantly been crushed under and charged over to protect Fury, Hill, Coulson and Bucky. Thor and Tony had tried to take to the sky to charge out of the now disintegrating roof, but it was then the second wave of explosions hit, with a force at least ten times greater than the first that sent all of the ground team, and cave rubble, flying out through the broken walls, scattering everyone by at least a hundred metres in radius.

Just an average day of dealing with Loki and his tricks. But the team was yet to see how this was easily the god's most grand scale and difficult scheme yet.

* * *

Author's note: Yeah, I know, I should be working on SHIELD Academy, but I've had this idea stuck in my head for ages and find it soothing to retreat too when I've got a writers block for the other one. SHIELD is still my precious most important baby, but here, have some more stuff-

Reviews/faves/follows are always very much appreciated! Thank you for reading! :'D


	2. Face to Face

Natasha's eyelids fluttered, the spy so good at masking herself she didn't even make a face at the throbbing pain resounding through her head. Reaching up a bruised hand, she brushed above her eyebrow and blinked as scarlet came away from the skin. Head injury, possible concussion. Warily wiggling each of her toes in turn and flexing her fingers, the Black Widow let out a small sigh of relief she hadn't broken her neck or snapped her spine. Keeping her calm despite the alarming thoughts flickering through her head that maybe her teammates hadn't been as lucky, the spy slowly and gingerly sat up. In the snow not so far away, she spotted a familiar piece of equipment sticking out, and she smiled ever so slightly. The things that bow had lived through without breaking…

Crawling across the snow, she pulled the bow out of the snow, knowing if it was here, Clint wouldn't be too far away. It might have been just her concussion, but the Russian could almost it was slightly smaller than she remembered-

At that moment, abruptly the spy was punched across her cheek, her depth perception and usually excellent senses weakened from both her aching head and her momentarily let down guard. Someone wrenched the bow from her fingers roughly and it was then Natasha's mind finally caught up with what was going on and she lashed out. She hooked her arms quickly around the figures legs and made them tumble to the ground. All basics reflex training. Now, she rolled on top of them so she could pin them and then hit them with a full blast of her Widow's Bite electro shockers until they went still. What could she say, Clint would have killed her if she had let someone steal his bow.

Rubbing her cheek as her eyes refocused, Natasha peered down at the unconscious would be thief then she gasped aloud, rolling off and away quickly and scrambling back on her hands and knees through the snow.

They had the same nose, the same habit of not wearing sleeves despite that it offered very little protection, and of course, the smaller bow, it wasn't Clint's. It was _hers_. This short, cropped haired brunette who Natasha had grappled with- She almost looked like she had to be related to Agent Barton! Scrambling up to her feet, in too much of a rush now to find Clint and make sure he was okay, Natasha again let surprise get the better of her and didn't notice the figure that had quickly slipped behind her and given her a powerful enough sleeper hold that her knees buckled and she crashed, face first, down onto the snow.

The person who had subdued her didn't even bother to check if Natasha really was down, he merely rushed over to the fallen girl, turning her over and frowning as her eyes began to flutter.

"Claire…? Can you hear me? Are you okay?"

When the girl, Claire, did eventually open her eyes, a hard grey blue, her eyes ran over the damage on the other as she quickly sat up straight and groped around until she found her bow beside her.

"Nikolai, your head, ouch." She noted with a grimace, referring to the scrape across his right eyebrow which had sent a trail of now dried blood down his face. Nikolai, the male, said absolutely nothing about his own injuries, still waiting for Claire to answer his questions, his blue green eyes serious and searching.

"Okay, okay, yeah… I'm fine. Bitch tried to steal my bow, and then for good measure hit me with stunners! Sorta similar to your ones. So yeah, I'm a little achy, but nothing too bad."

Content with her answer, Nikolai had just been about to tell Claire he had found her quiver a few paces from here when her startled expression told him not to speak as wind ruffled his red hair and a tip of an arrow was pressed in a gentle, cold warning against his skull.

Clint Barton glared down at the strangers, hardly caring about how they got here or what they were doing. He was pissed, not appreciating having spotted Natasha being attacked as he had limped around trying to find her. "…Listen closely, asshole, I don't take well to you attacking my teammate, so let's have a nice little chat about what the hell you think you're doing…"

A few dozen metres away, Tony Stark struggled as his crumpled and dinted suit managed to toss a pile of rocks off of himself before Jarvis's calm voice alerted him that power was at a critical two percent and it was advised he keep that in case Loki was still around. Reluctantly admitting there was some logic in that, Tony shut down any running system that was not crucial before he struggled with wrenching his beaten helmet off of his head. Sighing as his brown eyes finally were able to run over the damage, he crawled out of the last lot of debris before staggering along, kicking off useless piece of armour as he went, but still keeping the majority on and at the ready. Blinking snow and dirt out of his eyes, the genius spotted a familiar shape up ahead, wandering over to the red, white and blue shield resting on the ground. Reaching down, he dusted off a few pebbles on it, before being flung back by a powerful kick straight to his chest that dented the already weakened metal. Tony didn't hesitate once he had steadied himself, sending two jolts of repulsor energy back at his attacker only for them to be deflected off of Cap's shield. Loki obviously finally knew what he was doing, it seemed, maybe his first defeat and only been an opportunity for the trickster to learn and adapt to their fighting styles..

Deciding it was now or never, Tony sent the last of his power the thrusters, charging straight towards the shield and knocking it and the holder down to the ground where his heavy armour powered down and kept himself and his opponent trapped.

Much to his surprise, his was meet with a very feminine groan of pain, if such a thing existed. Glancing down as the dust cleared, the first thing he noticed were bright sky blue, heavily lashed eyes peaking out from under a darker blue mask that did not cover the woman's mouth or lower nose. The next thing Tony noticed was her hair, heaps and heaps of golden curls that framed her face like sunshine. If she hadn't been such a pain in the ass and wasted all the energy left in his suit, the billionaire genius might have felt sorry for this beautiful woman.

While he was merely bemused, she was positively startled as she studied his face, her blue eyes widening as she mouthed an 'Oh my god.'

Tony didn't have much time to sit and ponder as suddenly he was blasted from the side, straight off the woman, but at least he rolled just the right amount of times so he was face up rather than stuck kissing the dirt. Turning his aching neck to figure out what had just happened, his eyebrows nearly shot up into his hairline.

Helping up the beautiful and rather tall, he noted, blonde he had knocked down was a shorter woman with very dark brown hair that would be no longer than her shoulders if it wasn't in the messy little ponytail it was now. She was slightly tan, and had chocolate coloured eyes, but the most interesting thing about her was the fact she was decked, neck to toe in an almost identical set of armour as to Tony's Ironman suit, hers currently in slightly better condition to his broken set. Without the suit, she would be at least a foot shorter, but that was no comfort as she and the blonde sent an angry look his way and began to walk on over.

Just when the genius was forcing his life to flash before his eyes, Steve charged from out of nowhere at the side of the women and crashed straight into the one laden in armour. Tony had to admire the effort from where he was sprawled on the ground, and Cap did put up a hefty fight, but numbers worked again him in the end as the two girls co-ordinated. The blonde with the shield rolled under Steve's arm as he had gone to punch her. Kneeling quickly, she held her shield tightly at the perfect angle so that when her armoured friend shot a disruptor beam straight from her chest it deflected off the shield and hit Cap hard enough to send him to the ground like a sack of smoky potatoes.

The woman with the shield wandered over towards Tony as the other girl's suit began to let off the familiar sounds of burning through the last percent of energy. With what she had left, the brunette sat on the back of the fallen Captain America, grinning impishly as she lost control of the heavy armour.

"So, Steph!" She called out to the blonde, it must have been her name since it triggered a turning of the head. "…What are we gonna do with these pair? Do we even know who they are? Some trick of Loki's or something?"

Steph shook her head with a sigh. "I wish I knew… At first I thought it was you shooting at me, and now… I think that would have been a whole lot simpler to comprehend. If you can get out of your armour and still keep that one down with it, come here and have a look, this one looks scarily like you." Doing as her teammate said, the brunette manage to struggle out of the pieces, as she wandered over Tony noted with a smug satisfaction he had been right in guessing she would have been short without the armour.

"Wow Steph, you weren't kidding, holy shit. Glad I don't have that many wrinkles though…" She joked, though the blonde didn't laugh at all.

Tony just blinked up at her, for once lost for words, though he did frown quite noticeably at her remark.

"Toni, this is weird, way too weird. That's it, I'm calling it in to Fury, so much quicker than trying to find everybody-"

Steph's first few calls went unanswered, a gentle ringing the only sound that had broken a confrontation somewhere further along the field of rubble. Six people were gathered in a small spot, some sitting, some standing, some half buried with debris, but all six had a gun trained on a different person. Fury had his gun trained on a sombre looking dark haired man. That man had his gun trained on Phil, whose eyes darted between the three strangers, but his hand never wavered on the trigger of his own weapon pointed at a bald, dark skinned woman who looked startlingly like Director Fury. It was this woman who didn't dare answer her incoming call while her unblinking visible eye was narrowed, it and her gun trained on Agent Hill. Maria was good at keeping her poker face despite the whole distressing nature of the scenario, her head was clear as with good training her weapon was tracked on a sleekly dress woman with faint lines forming around her mouth and eyes. This woman's weapon was pointed at Fury and thus the cycle was complete.

After a few silent, tense moments, Nick Fury finally spoke, but never dropped his weapon.

"…Feel free to answer that." He wanted to see if this startlingly similar woman would take that chance, whether she would do the same as he would and take the call because it might mean another part of his team was in danger.

And take the call she did, holding her weapon steady even with one hand as her voice sounded, all business like and sharp.

"What is it Stephanie-?"

"Well, Fury, the weirdest thing… I found Toni, but before that I came across a man who… Well, to put it simply, looks so much like her they could be related."

"Believe me Captain, I understand, face to face with a carbon copy of my own right now. Until I sort out this situation, your orders are to find the others and regroup, Fury out."

Maria's jaw nearly dropped to the floor as the other signed out with that title and she shot her own Fury a desperate look as if he could make sense of it. To her further alarm, all Nick Fury seemed to do was start to lower his weapon as he spoke very calmly and warily.

"I think all six of us need to have a nice little talk and get our facts straight on what happened… Both sides of the story, alright?"

His mirror image with the extra X chromosome seemed to have to consider the offer, but slowly she lowered her own gun and waved her agents down to do the same.

"Alright. I've had enough crazy shit for today, time to try and apply some logic…" She murmured before her visible eye narrowed again and she gave a little, bitter laugh. "Let me guess, your problem started with a Norse deity of lies and tricks, am I right?"

Fury exhaled a moment as he waved his agents to lower their weapons too. "…I'm glad we're starting on the same page at least."

* * *

Author's note: Surely you can all see where this is going now, right~? Bah, writing action scenes are so fun! I always appreciate any feedback, favourites, follows... So yeah, go ahead! Or just read. The support is lovely either way.


	3. Far From Home

By the time both teams had reassembled, suspicion and confusion were running rampant and each group seemed quick to point the finger at each other.

Thor, Bruce and Bucky had all landed in isolation, apparently the same was the case with their effeminate counterparts. It took a little while to calm Thor enough so that he wouldn't go swinging at these 'figments of Loki's trickery.' And unsurprisingly, the towering, armoured voluptuous blonde opposite with her hair in a braid shouted similar remarks, her electric blue eyes shining under heavy, crease eyebrows as her teammates tried to sooth her mistrust. She carried a hammer identical to Thor's, brandishing it like one would wave a fist in anger, but slowly she was able to quiet down, settling on merely shooting the heroes she was not familiar with dark, stormy looks.

Bruce's counterpart looked just as battered as he did at the moment. Her clothes were shredded from where she too must have transformed to battle, though a sports bra and stretchy pants seemed to save her dignity where torn fabric could not. She sported broken, crooked glasses on her nose, with bushy curls pulled back into a chaotic ponytail that would have been a few inches past her shoulders if her hair was straight. She gave him a wary smile, seemingly just as tired and aching as Bruce felt, and he was glad for a moment his female form didn't seem to have quite the temper that Thor's did, especially if she did have to deal with the other guy-, ahem, _girl_.

Bucky's counterpart had exactly the same reaction as he did when entering the clearing, training a gun on the nearest person who she didn't recognise and quickly switching targets every time she noticed another until both she and Bucky had their weapons pointing at each other. Their dark brown eyes both widened in recognition and realisation at exactly the same time. Bucky couldn't bring himself to speak, and merely lowered his weapon and looked back to Fury, refusing to acknowledge the lean, hardened woman with wispy, dark brown hair that fell free just below her shoulders. Bucky was sure she was ignoring him too, and for a crazy moment he wonder what her name would be, whether she had a nickname like his, whether she had been through the traumatic brainwashing and experiences that had turned him into the Winter Soldier. As if able to hear his thoughts, her hands clenched and he caught the glint of metal under the edge of one of her gloves. The same metal arm he had, by result of his fall from the train. His blood ran cold and Bucky shook away his thoughts, unable to get a clear handle on how he felt about that.

Clint, who had warily lowered his bow when he had received Fury's call and was sure the two he had threatened weren't going to turn on him, had arrived back walking well behind Claire and Nikolai. He had carried Natasha until she had gained consciousness halfway on the walk back and stubbornly insisted she was not a damsel in distress and could walk on her own two feet. Having already been exposed to Claire, she was not as freaked out as she noticed the similarities between herself and Nikolai, and grudgingly she had to admire he had a very mean sleeper grip, even if she had to experience it firsthand. The fell into place looming back behind their Fury and fellow SHIELD agents, eerily in synch with Nikolai and Claire as they did the same.

The Stark's and the Rogers' were the last Avengers back for both sides. Tony had abandoned his drained armour when Steph had let him after getting the call from Nikita Fury there was a tentative truce now in place. He and Toni had walked back, seemingly quite content to swap stories after getting over the shock of the whole scenario, though Steph and Steve thought the only reason the two Stark's were talking was to try and trump one another with their accomplishments. There was only enough room in the world for the ego of one Stark, after all. Steph and Steve gave themselves a wary, formal distance. Like two troops on opposing sides of the war giving each other enough space during a truce to bury their dead. However, feeling guilty as she spotted the hole Toni's repulsor beam had made in his suit and the burn that was beneath, Steph apologised profusely for that.

"I understand, battle reflexes, you work a lot better with her than I do with my Tony." Steve noted quickly, glancing ahead to the two Stark's who looked so small without their suits, but were bickering just as confidentially as if they were hidden beneath pounds of protective metal.

Steph gave a chuckle at that, shaking her head with an exasperated sigh. "…Trust me, it's not as easy as it looks, we just know sometimes we have to step above our own issues and work as a team. United you stand, divided you fall and all that. Toni co-operates… Most of the time. Just let her feel like the big hero and her ego does the rest of the teamwork for her."

By now they had reached the two groups and the Fury's began to take control, conversing quickly with each other out of ear shot of their teams, but slowly nodding every so often. With folded arms, Nick and Nikita turned back to their reunited ground teams.

"…Okay." Nick began, hushing everyone's quiet chatter. "…From what we can gather, we all find ourselves face to face with… Well, ourselves."

And just as everyone pipped up loudly to try and ask how that was possible Nikita's slightly higher voice rang out, and Nick found himself impressed how a slightly shrill tone could shut double the Avengers up so easily.

"ANYWAY, what we believe, is that Loki lured both our teams to a trap. And yes, before you ask questions, we have a Loki as well, she's a pain in the ass." Catching the thunderous look from the braided blonde, Nikita sighed. "Sorry Thora, but it's true. Now back to what I was saying, we can't see the purpose so far, but the Loki's have obviously co-conspired."

Nick piped up again, catching where Nikita left off without missing a heartbeat, their thoughts so in synch it was eerie even thought they were nearly carbon copies. "The glowing magic we all hit, at the same time, on both sides… We're guessing that the Loki's have somehow entwined the fabric of our two dimensions. When we all threw our own energy at the field, we sealed the final connection."

"The next priority needs to be discovering if our worlds have been fused through Loki's little trick, or, if one team have just been sent to the other's home." Nikita finally finished, both Fury's giving a wizened nod at the summary at the same time.

"…And just how the hell are we meant to figure that out?" Clint's voice rang out, sarcastic and clearly unimpressed with the chaos this mission had spiralled into.

It wasn't one of the Fury's who spoke, instead the short girl who was meant to be his counterpart, Claire, shot back with a tone full of just the same snark.

"That's obvious, dumb ass, we contact people we know who weren't near the blast radius. If they're the gender that we know them as, you guys are stuck in our world. If they're yours, we're stuck. If they're freaking out and babbling about a clone, we're fused."

The woman who must have been Phil's double spoke up now, frowning as the creases between her eyebrows grew more prominent. "And who can we trust to deal with top priority SHIELD information? This incident needs to be kept under quiet wraps, imagine the world's panic. Civilisation already barely accepts amazing super humans, imagine the uproar if suddenly double that power turned up in the world."

So all twenty of them sat for some time, puzzling over a possible confident with secret keeping skills, when suddenly Tony and Toni blurted out at exactly the same time, a loud and simple; "PEPPER!" For a little while they blinked at each other, amused.

"You have a Pepper too?"

"Duh, I mean, why would I bother calling him Virgil all the time, that's just… Boring."

"Did he make you promise to technically not be a superhero too?"

"Yep, oh god, maybe we shouldn't call Pepper then, we're both gonna get an earful about this-"

"STARK!" Both Nick and Nikita yelled, making everybody except the SHIELD agents jump with the amplification of two furious Fury's being just plain terrifying. Both Stark's sobered up at their anger and in mirroring motions wandered a little away from the main body of the group to make the calls from their respective ear pieces.

Toni held her breath, knowing so soon she was going to get yelled at and nagged about breaking her promise. She could see Virgil 'Pepper' Potts face in her mind from memory. Every freckle on his nose, the worry lines between his brow, bright green eyes that had only ever shown Toni kindness and even a love she didn't deserve at all. Toni was the worst girlfriend in history, risking her life on a daily basis, flirting up a storm with everyone when she went to social events, sleeping and eating so rarely that Pepper was starting to become just as much as an insomniac as she was from staying up all night and worrying about her. And now, the one thing he had basically begged her not to do, Toni had done it. She had remade the suit after only a couple of months clean, she had returned to action. Taking care of the world's problems when she could barely take care of herself…

Tony was having similar thoughts while the dial tone rang through his head, though he was more focussed on the technicalities. He had said project 'clean slate', not project 'I will never do this thing again'. He would've died today in the explosion if he hadn't remade his armour, then again, if he had properly kept his promise he wouldn't have been up north in the first place-

"Tony?" Chimed a familiar voice, the tone curious and light. Pepper obviously hadn't been home yet, to find him missing, his lab wide open with the rush he had been in to respond to Fury's call, a simple note of: '_I'm sorry_' scribbled for her to find. Explaining the situation in a rush, Pepper forgot to even be angry about Tony's broken promise, instead she fretted about details like the explosion and whether he was hurt. Sighing in relief, he assured her he was fine before ending the call, feeling better now that he had heard her voice.

Tony turned to his counterpart, who had dropped to her knees in the snow, her hand shakily pressing the re-dial for a seventh time. As again it rang out into nothing, Toni refused to believe she was separated a dimension away from Pepper. No, it couldn't be, he just had to be angry, avoiding her calls, his phone had died. Logic niggled away at her feeble defences, a stinging voice reminding Toni that Pepper always charged his phone routinely, three times throughout the day, and the new software she had personally installed for him gave any device a battery life of at least twelve hours regardless. And no matter how angry Pepper could get, never had he refused to answer her calls, especially after a shaky night after New York where Toni had confessed what she thought would be her last phone call had gone out to him, unanswered.

Toni felt stupid that only minutes ago she had dreaded Pepper's wrath. Now she longed for it, any echo of his voice, no matter the topic. He could call her every nasty name in the book and say he was walking out of her life and tired of all her bullshit. Anything would have been better than this nothingness.

Tony felt a deep pity go out to the girl who was slowly folding in on herself as the dead line tone began to play once more, wandering over, he helped Toni off the ground, the shorter woman too numb to even realise she was leaning on him for support as they wandered back to the group.

At the Fury's expectant looks, Tony wondered how to phrase this so he wasn't too blunt for the wreck his counterpart seemed to be at the moment, barely holding herself together.

"I got through, Pepper wants me home straight away, but apart from that, I'm unscathed. But Toni-"

It was the first time he had used her name, and it seemed to be enough to jolt her from her shock. She gave them all a forced bright grin and tried to airily laugh it all off.

"Bad news ladies, and Nikolai and Marcus, we're a long way from Kansas, and unfortunately I left my sparkly red high heels at home."

Steph and Nikita exchanged a long look, wondering how long Toni was going to hold together at the seams, before turning to start making plans and arrangements with Nick about where they would stay to keep this whole scenario incognito until they could figure out a way to get home.

Steve was the only person who was left, as most began talking among themselves, who noticed the bubble of tears start to trail down Toni's face as she turned away, her shaky hand still pressing the redial button every time she thought no one would notice, clinging on to blind hope that she wasn't as far out of her depth as she really felt.


	4. Genius Billionaire Player Philantropist

Toni Stark's very obvious meltdown was fast becoming a worrying problems for both her team and those whose world they had been misplaced in.

In three weeks since Loki had royally screwed them over, the short brilliant brunette had already broken the curfew keeping them in Stark tower six times, drank her way through some priceless bottles of wine out of Tony's collection, and even once hacked into her counter parts lab and changed every access code in the building. It had taken several hours of Tony furiously pounding on the glass outside as Toni tinkered with the scraps of her suit, hoping the half-hearted repairs would distract her from this whole giant mess, before her bearded, slightly taller self managed to guess what her new password had been and swiftly shooed her out. She had argued with him for hours later, their egos at last coming to a full and fiery crash as Steph had predicted, how did she 'break' into his lab if technically it was hers too and she knew the codes?

It was officially 12:47pm on the third week and fourth day of being in the wrong universe when Toni made her seventh successful breakout.

Armed with little more than the Stark Industries credit card in her wallet, which she was delighted to learn still worked even though it was technically from another world, retail therapy was possibly the least destructive way she had coped in the last few weeks.

Inside Toni was burning, not just from missing Pepper, but from missing everything about her home.

Here she was the same weak little girl she had been treated as for most of her childhood, the woman who was still even to this day mocked behind her back by businessmen who rivalled and supported her company in equal measure. They used to be sexist to her face, until the day she had not only unveiled the revolutionary plans for arc reactor energy, but had also personally over seen every stage in the process. Every equation, every construction. All these traditionally 'male' jobs and she could do them better than anyone she had ever met.

She hadn't flirted her way to top of her class in Engineering at MIT, at only seventeen years of age, after all.

Toni had been working so hard for respect her whole damn life, and here she was in a man's game once more, denied access to technologies she had invented, told to wait and sit pretty locked away in the tower.

Like hell she was going to comply, she was Toni god damn Stark, Ironmaiden. No one told her what to do. She barely listened to Nikita Fury, what the hell did she owe to the SHIELD Director's counterpart? Nope, she wasn't going to go down without a fight, even if the other version of herself wanted her too.

After several hours of Fury, SHIELD and the incognito members of the Avengers trying to track the erratic patterns of Toni's disappearance, it had been Steve who had finally found her.

With her arms laden with dozens of heavy shopping bags, she had no chance of outrunning him. Hell, even if she didn't have the bags, the fact he is a super soldier would probably mean she had no chance. So instead, Toni tried to feign a mildly surprised expression, like she was unaware he had been looking for her, as well as at least thirty agents and the rest of his team.

"Excellent! I needed a hand with these, come here-"

Unceremoniously dumping half a dozen bags his way before Steve even had the time to sigh, Toni pretended to remain oblivious to his disapproving stare.

"Toni- What are you doing, you know people aren't meant to see you out and about? Imagine what they would think-"

She cut him off, her tone incredibly blunt.

"They would see a midget, since I've got no heels at the moment, trying to do her shopping. Not like I'm whizzing around blasting things in my suit-"

Biting back a protest, Steve just shook his head at her, before walking a little away from the crowd of bustling shoppers, his voice dropping to a whisper, but his tone was still sharp, not appreciating the number of goose chases she had been responsible for in the last few weeks.

"Stark, what's your problem?"

Her brown eyes flashed then, narrowing into slits as if he had crossed some invisible line.

"What's my problem?!" Her voice was a stinging hiss, quiet at first but grew louder with every second. "Oh, I don't know, maybe the fact I'm so far away from my home and we all have no god damn clue how to get back. It could be that I'm being treated like a stupid little girl because of my gender, apparently I'm not considered clever enough to be discreet the moment I step out of the tower!"

She was working up into a full rant now, people were beginning to slow and stare at her and Steve.

"Or maybe it's the fact that not even once have any of you stopped to ask how my team and I might be feeling! Stop treating us like inconveniences on your perfect little lives, or like you're our begrudging baby sitters, because we're human too, and we sure as hell didn't ask for this!"

She threw all her own bags down at Steve's feet, beginning to storm off before he could react, shouting a few last remarks over her shoulder.

"We deserve respect too, not just because most of us are women, but because we've had pretty fucking hard lives and this is just another issue on our plates. We have suffered everything that you guys have, but what do we have to show for it now? Nothing but a hasty order to stay placid and quiet in a tower while your people figure out what to do with us."

Stunned as Toni was gone so quickly after her explosion, Steve gave the crowd around a bewildered look. He scrambled to pick up her bags, feeling incredibly guilty that he had set her off like that when already she had clearly not been coping well- He felt so stupid, the last thing she probably needed was a confrontation. But then again, he couldn't understand her overreaction, it had only been a simple question… And it had mainly been asked because he was concerned with her recent behaviour.

Maybe he just hadn't done it the right way… Women were a mystery, after all.

And a mystery he had very little experience with, at that.

When Steve had arrived back to the tower, he had been surprised when Coulson alerted him that Toni had returned twenty or so minutes before him. He carried the shopping bags to the door of the room she was staying in before warily knocking. Silence greeted him, and assuming she didn't want to be disturbed, he left the bags outside.

Inside the room, Toni had been sprawled on the cream coloured bed sheets, peering up at the impersonal white ceiling. Her room was always decked in brilliant shades of red and gold, with beautiful dark stained wood furniture. Her bed was a king size, naturally, not this weak excuse for a double. She would bet all her fortune back home (she reminded herself in the eyes of others she had nothing here), that Tony's room would feel familiar. It would probably have the same layout, even the same size walk in wardrobe.

There just wasn't enough room for two Stark's, with their flashy taste and giant egos, to co-exist like this.

They were no step closer to a way home, not that anyone would update the stranded team, they were still treating them like inferiors, like copies of the originals.

Toni crawled off the bed, bending down and reaching under it to fish out the dozens of bottles of wine she had nicked from the cellar and hidden in case of the possibility everyone got so sick of her escape attempt they confined her to the room.

She couldn't spend another few weeks like this, and what if it spanned into months? Even years? It was painful to think about, after such a long hard climb to be at the top in her own world, here she was cruelly cast down to the bottom in this place that was so familiar, yet so entirely different.

These pales boring walls were not hers, the material of the sheets was not cotton or silk which were the only two fabrics she could handle on her skin when trying to sleep. Her only mirror was a small hanging one by the door which was nothing to the full wall of mirror in her walk in wardrobe.

This world would never be Toni's, at least not while the people in it tried to shun her, along with the rest of her team, and hush up their inconvenient existence.

Reminded oddly of Hamlet's old 'to be or not to be' monologue as she uncorked the first wine bottle with hands long accustomed to this action from years of collective drinking experience. She ran through the lines, trying to bring the college production she had learned the story from to the fore front of her mind.

Something about slings and arrows, she concluded, and whether they were worth it just for the sake of being alive. A fair enough question, Toni found herself agreeing, rather bitterly, with the deluded Danish prince, though his troubles really had nothing on the drama that her life had been.

And thus the next few hours Toni Stark devoted her efforts to drinking until she was sick, and then beyond, praying the alcohol poisoning that had never come over years of partying could finally steal her from her sea of troubles today.

She thought of Pepper and how angry he would be, or sad. It all depended on the time it would take for the others to get home and deliver the news. Maybe they would lie and say she died in the first confrontation, buried in an explosion or something. Toni really couldn't care anymore, her hands were starting to go numb which made the seventh bottle hard to grip between her slim fingers.

She had barely managed to get halfway on this one before keeling over, her vision slipping to black as her head hit the carpet and calmness washed over her. One last sluggish phrase crossed her mind as the end drew nearer and she would have smiled if she remembered how to through the intoxication.

_And by opposing, end them._

- Waking up hadn't been part of the plan but, unfortunately, Toni did.

The room was white enough to be heaven but the smell of disinfectant and sterility gave it away for the hospital it really was and the genius shuddered heavily. She really hated any location to do with the medical profession, and couldn't trust these types of doctors as far as she could throw them. Another reason it had taken her so long to man up and have the procedure to remove the metal around her heart as well as the arc reactor.

Another promise to Pepper, Toni's chest ached nearly as painfully as if she still had shrapnel embedded in it.

Hearing footsteps, Toni pretended to slip back into her coma as the door to her room opened and the tapping of at least two pairs of feet echoed back at her.

"How is it possible she's only turning thirty? I thought you were all meant to be just like us, and Stark is definitely closer to pushing forty!" This voice was male, Steve's, Toni could compare it easily with the echo of 'What's your problem?' in her head.

The other spoke up then, and with a rush of guilt she made out the loyal voice of Steph. They were nearly opposites, and not particularly close friends, but the blonde always had been very good to the genius when she needed someone. They made an excellent team, and had stepped somewhat on a more united path after their initial loathing for each other when the Avengers Initiative had only just begun.

"I'm sure there's differences between you and I as well, but just think about it. You knew Howard Stark, your Tony's father. I knew Harriet Stark, my Toni's mother. The woman who shuddered at the idea of having a family because it meant she wouldn't be able to keep as effective a reign over her company. She was ambitious, the life of the party, and just as career driven as Howard, I'm sure."

Steph paused and Toni got the feeling she had looked towards her, hesitating as if worried she might betray the brunette's confidence.

"…Toni told me, since I was more surprised than anyone that Harriet had ever let herself have a child, she had only caved when Toni's father, Mario, had threatened to leave her. As much as she loved her career, her love for Mario was just as strong, and along with the fruitless attempts at finding me in the ocean beginning to wear her down, the choice wasn't hard in the end. Nine months after that decision, Toni was born, when Harriet was nearly forty. I think we can explain the age difference there."

Toni resisted the urge to snort, with great difficulty, if only to maintain her cover. Steph made it sound so romantic, like she had settled into domestic bliss for the sake of her husband, but that was absolute bullshit. The moment Toni was weaned onto the bottle was the moment Harriet shuffled her off onto nannies and had gone on with her job as if pretending she hadn't even left.

The only thing Harriet bothered to leave Toni with included her own last name of Stark, Mario hadn't seemed to mind in much the same way he was happy to let his wife not take his name for the sake of the company.

She had only dealt with the judging looks and non-maternal figure of Harriet Stark until she was in her sixth year of life. Both her father and mother had perished in a car crash. Toni vaguely remembered glimpses like the headlines on papers and magazines, or the clamber of everyone trying to fight about who the company belonged to.

Harriet Stark's will silenced the angry men in suits who thought they had the right to take over something they had never been a part of the building of. Odette Stane had become both in charge of Stark Industries, until the remaining Stark reached the age of 21, and she also the one burdened with the custody of a young Toni.

It probably would have been the nicest thing Harriet had ever done for her daughter, if not for what Odette turned out to be. Toni had to basically accept her mother figure since she was six had tried to kill her, more than once in her adult life, and that she had to personally be the one to take her down.

And people wondered why she drank so much, or couldn't keep up a stable relationship.

Snapping Toni from such thoughts, Steve apparently had whistled through his teeth at that new bit of information, puzzling over the fact that maybe the counterparts were more different than they seemed after all.

There was a long pause, before he spoke up again, a touch of guilt shining through into his voice.

"…I feel bad, you know? Like, it was my words that had set her off… She didn't need me on top of her too."

_With a body like that, you can get on top of me any day, at least if you mean literally._

Those were Toni's thoughts, but what she actually pipped up and said at last was completely different, with a voice of pure, dripping sarcasm.

"Ahuh, because every time a man is mean to me, I go and do something like this, right?" She snorted, a difficult action with the current tube down her nostril. "Puh-lease, don't give yourself an ego like that, you and your people aren't my only problem."

Steph sighed wearily at the banter, hardly surprised Toni's first words were full of snark.

"I'm going to get more coffee, even I can't deal with this drama at 4am without it, would you like some, Steve?"

The male super soldier nodded his head and as Steph glided from the room Toni whined something on the bed about 'thanks for asking, I'd love a cup too!'

Taking the opportunity, now or never, Steve gently cut between Toni's muttering.

"I'm really sorry, you know, for how upset you got after I found you… And I- I told my 'side' about how you were feeling. Fury's thinking of reconsidering some of the conditions of your stay, and Tony… He's decided to let you have full access of the tower, after I specifically argued with him about you having every bit the right to access as he does."

Toni rolled her eyes, but did seem to perk up at the news about the tower.

"…This is only because I tried to kill myself, isn't it?"

Steve winced at how nonchalantly she had said that, like she had predicted they'd all be on tender hooks and watched the way they treated not only Toni, but all the alternates currently calling their world home.

"I'm not sure about the others, but no, not for me. I'm treating you better because you were right, and I didn't realise it. Talking to Steph, I started to realise that you didn't all just magically appear into the people you are. You've worked for it, suffered just as much as we have, and we can't be making it any easier on you all."

Toni stared at him, utterly perplexed, but slightly bemused, before eventually she laughed and settled back on the pillows, losing all her hostility and starting to warm up to Steve. "…Okay, okay, jeez you are such a boy scout, but I accept your apology without suspicion. And, I'm kinda sorry for scaring everyone… I don't know what happened yesterday."

Steve shook his head, pointing at a calendar on the wall.

"Actually, it's Monday, you've been out of it for the whole weekend. Nearly drank your way into preservation."

Toni didn't skip a beat, bouncing off his words with her ever sharp wit.

"…I still think it's a better way to stay young than being turned into a capsule."

Only a Stark would dare make jokes about Steve's freezing, and only a Stark could do it with such a perfect delivery that it made even the super soldier himself laugh.

And as he laughed, Toni joined in with her own higher trill, and they couldn't stop. Not until tears poured down their cheeks and a haughty doctor stuck his head in to shush the pair. Even then Steve had to nearly stuff his fist in his mouth to stop while Toni had her hands over her mouth to muffle her post belly laugh giggles.

It wasn't long after that Steph returned and between the two of them fretting over her, Toni began to feel like the queen bee she usually was even though the hospital bed was a poor substitute for a metaphorical throne.

Maybe, just maybe, there was enough room for her after all. And as she caught Steve's eye when he was about to take a swig of coffee, the male super soldier had waited until Steph's back was turned to sneak Toni a sip.

If even just one of the other side was starting to treat her like a human, maybe she could do this after all


End file.
